


so dawn goes down to day

by anna_iluj



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, aang dies and katara is the next avatar au, don't worry appa is alive, hakoda tries to adopt zuko because his dad sucks, iroh believes in azula and wants to find the good in her
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:22:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24853771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anna_iluj/pseuds/anna_iluj
Summary: Water. Earth. Fire. Air. Long ago, the four nations lived together in harmony. Then, everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked. Only the Avatar, master of all four elements, could stop them, but when the world needed him most, he vanished. A hundred years passed and Avatar Aang died slowly in an iceberg, leaving his companion Appa alone.  Now I am the next Avatar.  And although my waterbending skills are great, I still have a lot to learn before I am ready to save anyone. But my brother believes that I can save the world.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	so dawn goes down to day

** Chapter One: The Body In The Iceberg **

This iceberg was bigger than anything Katara could have made during her outburst. She knew that, even if her stupid, sexist brother was looking at her like this was all her fault.

“Leave it to the girl to destroy the canoe!” Sokka moaned as he picked up an ice chunk with chunks of wood embedded in it from their smashed boat. “Gran Gran is going to kill me because you couldn’t control your temper! If we can ever get back to the village, that is. We’re doomed!”

“Sokka, look out!” Katara shoved him out of the way as the strange, glowing iceberg split down the middle and pieces started falling towards them. A blinding beam of blue light shot up into the sky and Katara cursed her luck. Based on how today was going, they’d probably run into an angry water spirit.

***

Zuko fumbled with the spyglass and nearly dropped it as the bright light nearly blinded him. “What are you looking at?” he snapped at a crew member who was unfortunate enough to be on deck nearby.

“Nothing, Prince Zuko.” The crewman bowed and started to walk away.

“That’s right! Nothing! None of you lazy imbeciles have noticed that massive spiritual signal. Well, I have! That’s why I will be the one to find the Avatar after a hundred years. Finally, I can reclaim my honor and return home!”

“Prince Zuko, we have been down this road before. Why don’t you sit and enjoy a cup of calming jasmine tea?” Iroh considered his pai sho tiles. He hadn’t played the White Lotus Gambit since setting sail with his nephew. It would be nice to find a master to play with sometime when they made port.

“I DON’T NEED TEA, I NEED TO CAPTURE THE AVATAR AND RECLAIM MY HONOR!”

Iroh sighed and looked at the horizon. “Prince Zuko, I think you may have a bigger problem. Look.” He pointed to the distant clouds of black smoke.

“What could possibly be bigger than-- Zhao! What is he doing here?”

“He is probably here for the same reason you are, nephew.” Iroh breathed heat back into his tea. He couldn’t wait until they left the South Pole and he could enjoy his favorite beverage again without his cup freezing.

“Well, it doesn’t matter, not as long as we capture the Avatar first. Crew! Full steam ahead!”

***

A small yellow and orange shape floated out from the center of the iceberg. Sokka stared at it and hoped it wasn’t what he thought it was. His sister didn’t need to see anything that gruesome today.

“Sokka, it’s a kid! We have to help him!” Katara froze the water around the broken iceberg so she could run over to it.

Sokka groaned. That was his sister, always charging into things without a plan. Sure, her heart was in the right place when it came to helping people, but she never thought about the consequences and he would always have to clean up the mess. He hurried to catch up with her.

The boy was floating face down in the water. Sokka helped Katara gently flip him over, but he knew it was pointless. No one turned that shade of blue when they were still alive.

There was something strange about his face that Sokka couldn’t quite figure out. Something about him just didn’t look like the other dead bodies that Sokka had seen. The way the blue seemed more uniform in places, even though it blended in with his skin… “Katara, these are tattoos. He’s an airbender.”

“Not just any airbender. Sokka, this has to be the Avatar!”

“AAAUUUGGGHHH!”

“Get behind me! It’s a monster!” Sokka pushed his sister backwards and drew his boomerang as a giant horned beast climbed out of the broken shell of an iceberg.

“Don’t be stupid. See, it’s got an arrow on his head just like the Avatar. This must be a sky bison.” Katara walked up to the creature and patted it on the head. “It’s not eating me, so it must be friendly.”

“AUGHH!” The sky bison leaned down to nuzzle the body.

“I’m sorry, buddy, I don’t think we can help him. Can you help us get him back to our village? Maybe our Gran Gran will know about some weird Avatar trick that will wake him up.” Sokka put his boomerang away. The sky bison didn’t seem like much of a threat. Usually, Sokka didn’t believe animals had real emotions, just instincts, but this one looked heartbroken.

***

Zuko knew his small ship was supposed to humiliate him. Whenever he made port, it looked ridiculous next to the real Fire Navy ships. Just another symbol of the banished prince’s shame. Now as he raced Zhao’s massive fleet through the ice floes, Zuko was glad that he had a more maneuverable vessel.

He wasn’t sure where he was going. Not exactly. All that mattered was he was close. Closer than he’d ever managed to get in the three years since he’d been banished.

It didn’t matter what Uncle said. Zuko knew the Avatar was waiting for him. Nothing, not Zhao, not his father, not Agni himself would keep him from claiming his honor and his destiny.

***

Katara helped Sokka put the last block of ice into place over the Avatar’s body. They hadn’t been able to hide this from the kids in the village after they rode in on a swimming sky bison, but luckily they had kept them from getting a close look at the body. These kids hadn’t even been born yet when the last of the Fire Nation raiders had attacked. They had never seen a dead body.

Katara had, though. She’d watched her mother die. She had only left her side when her father had dragged her away. Dead bodies didn’t phase her anymore.

“Go to the Southern Air Temple and see if you can learn what the Air Nomads did with their dead. We will keep the Avatar here in the meantime so that the cold will preserve him,” Gran Gran had told them when they had arrived back at the village.

Katara had never thought about leaving home before. Sure, she knew she would need to go to the North Pole one day if she wanted to find a waterbending teacher, but with the war going on it just seemed too dangerous. Sokka had, though. She knew how badly he’d wanted to go with the men when they left. It was for the best that he hadn’t gone, though, because now the Avatar could have a Water Tribe honor guard to wherever his final resting place would be.

“We should leave soon. I just need to grab some more seal jerky and then I’ll be ready. See if you can figure out how to get this thing to fly.” Sokka left to go back towards the village, leaving Katara alone with the sky bison and the Avatar.

“Hey, buddy.” Katara sat down next to the sky bison. “I know this is really hard on you. I don’t know much about your relationship, but I’m guessing he was your friend. We need your help to find out what kind of funeral he would want, and that means leaving him behind for a little while. We don’t have enough people to take a boat all the way to the Southern Air Temple, but I understand if you can’t leave him.”

The sky bison groaned.

“You can take as much time as you need. I’ll give you some space.” Katara walked a short distance away and sat back down. At least, she thought she did. When she looked back at where the sky bison and the body had been, all she saw was an empty expanse of ice.

“Alright, this is weird. Maybe it’s just an Avatar thing and he’s gone off to be reincarnated.”

“Yep! I have!”

Katara spun around. Behind her was the boy from the iceberg. He looked alive and cheerful, but translucent.

“Hiya! I’m Aang. I’m your Avatar guide, but I don’t know much about Avatar stuff so this will be a learning experience for both of us!”

“Woah, slow down. Where did your bison go? And what do you mean by Avatar guide?” Katara didn’t question how Aang was seemingly alive and talking to her. That must have been just an Avatar thing.

“Appa? He’s right where we left him. We’re in the spirit world now. I’m here to help you learn how to be the new Avatar, but I never really learned how to do that myself. We’ve done it thousands of times, though, so it can’t be that hard.”

“Wait, do you mean I’m the next Avatar?”

***

Zuko wasn’t trying to run through the wall around the village. That didn’t really matter, because he would have if he had seen it coming. Zhao was hot on his trail and he had been paying more attention to what was behind him than what was directly in front of his ship.

A lone Water Tribe warrior was running at the ship with a club. Zuko gestured to his crew to stand back. He could handle this on his own.

It didn’t take long to disarm the warrior and knock him out with his own club. If this was the best the Southern Water Tribe had to offer, no wonder they had been so easy to defeat.

Zuko looked around at the assembled women, children, and elders. “Bring me the Avatar or I will melt your village. I know you’re hiding him.”

A single old woman stepped forward. “The Avatar hasn’t been seen in one hundred years. If he was hiding here, surely one of your raiding parties would have found him by now.”

Zuko turned back to his crew. “Search every building. He didn’t have much time to get away.” He stepped forward and pressed his sword against the old woman’s throat before addressing the rest of the pathetic village. “If any of you so much as breathe at any of my crew, I will slit her throat.”

“Don’t hurt my Gran Gran!” A Water Tribe girl ran up to the assembled crowd, panting hard like she’d come a long way. She started to move like she was going to waterbend, but Zuko pressed gently with his sword and she stopped, realizing that she was going to get her precious grandmother killed.

“I won’t have to hurt her if you tell me where the Avatar is hiding.”

The Water Tribe girl glared at him. “If I tell you, will you take the Avatar and leave everyone else alone?”

Zuko eased up on the sword. Finally, someone with common sense. “Yes. If you tell me where he is, I’ll take him and leave your village.”

“You’re looking right at her.” The Water Tribe girl crossed her arms.

This took Zuko by surprise. “What, your  _ Gran Gran _ is the Avatar?”

“No, you idiot, I am! Now let her go and I’ll go with you!” 

Zuko sheathed his sword. “Fine, but if I find out you’re lying I’ll come back here and make what my great-grandfather did to the Air Nation look merciful.”

“Katara--” the old woman started, then thought better of it. So the girl had a name.

“Men, get back to the ship! We’re taking the Avatar back to the Firelord!” Zuko remembered what happiness had felt like before his banishment. This wasn’t it, but he felt the faint promise of happiness at the thought of returning home with his honor.

Maybe that’s what distracted him from the giant ship tearing through the ice wall next to his.

“Actually, you’re not. I am.” Zhao stood proudly on the deck of his ship. It hadn’t taken him as long to catch up as Zuko had hoped.


End file.
